Staples of retaining rings



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kIYITHIl llH May 23, 1961 H. ERDMANN STAPLES OF RETAINING RINGS Filed May 24, 1957 INVENTOR HANS ERD MANN ATTORNEY May 23, 1961 H. ERDMANN 2,985,295

STAPLES OF RETAINING RINGS Filed May 24, 1957 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 W/l/A INVENTOR HANS ERDMANN ATTORNEY United States Patent STAPLES F RETAINING RINGS Hans Erdmann, Maplewood, N.J., assignor to Waldes Kohinoor Inc. L0 Is of New ork g land City, N.Y., a corporation This invention relates to improvements in staples of spring retaining rings, and more particularly to an improved retaining ring staple providing a unitary strip or column of connected and aligned spring retaining rings and to a method of producing same.

As is well known, spring retaining rings of the type adapted to provide an artificial locating shoulder on shafts, p ns and the like comprise split or open-ended ring bodies stamped or otherwise fashioned from spring metal and having a width of gap between their open ends which is less than their free inner diameter. To facilitate the assembly of such rings on their shafts, a plurality of the rings are arranged in stack or column formation on the stack rod of a ring dispenser, from which they are withdrawn one at a time, usually by a dispensing tool which also serves as a ring handling and assembling tool. When stacked as aforesaid, the rings are of course in radial face engagement and, to insure their withdrawal from the stack rod by the applicator tool, they must also be disposed with their gaps in exact vertical alignment.

The basic problem to which the present invention is addressed is how to provide a so-called staple or multiphcity of such retaining rings disposed and secured in face engagement and with their gaps exactly aligned as aforesa d, which can be handled as a unit in packaging and shipment and, even more important, which can be transferred as a self-contained ring package to the stack rod of a dispenser, and which also provides for release of the secured rings from one another for one-by-one dispensmg thereof, with assurance that the necessary fixed angular relation of the rings remains undisturbed and also that all rings, excepting the ring in the assembly-readiness position (usually the lowermost ring of the stack), will be held to the stack rod against transverse dislocation.

As previously constructed, staples of retaining rings comprised a temporary stack rod in the form of a rigid, usually metal, rod or strip profiled according to the inner edge of the rings to be loaded thereon and having a plurality of the retaining rings mounted thereon and held in face engagement, the rings being so cooperated with the rod or strip in assembly thereon that they assume a position of axial and circumferential registry with one another. Obviously, the method of making up such ring stacks is relatively complicated in that it requires mounting of the rod or strip in a suitable fixture, manually threading a multiplicity of individual retaining rings thereon, binding the rings to the rod so that they cannot become displaced therefrom, and, finally, removal of the ring stack and its rod from the fixture in which the rod was initially mounted. The aforesaid manifold operations required to produce the prior retaining ring staples of course increased the cost of the ring to the ultimate purchaser. In addition, it was necessary, to insure proper trans-fer of the ring column from the temporary to the permanent stack rod of the dispenser, to provide attaching means on the temporary stack rod and/or the dispenser serving to connect the ring-loaded temporary stack rod to the permanent stack rod, said attaching means being of a character as to permit release of the temporary stack rod following movement of the ring load therefrom, so that it could be removed and thrown away.

These latter requirements in the use of the prior retaining ring staples also reflected themselves in increased ring costs to the purchaser.

A main object of the invention is the provision of a simple yet effective and thoroughly dependable staple of retaining rings which substitutes for the rigid, usually metallic, rod or strip upon which the multiplicity of the retaining rings making up the stack were threaded according to the prior practice, a ring-to-ring holding means which is of a flexible nature and which engages the outer peripheries of the multiplicity of the rings making up the staple or column thereof in such a way as effectively to secure said rings in face engagement and in exact axial and circumferential registry.

Yet another object of the, invention is the provision of a staple of retaining rings comprising a multiplicity of said rings secured in face-to-face engagement and in exact axial alignment and circumferential registry by a strip of adhesive or adhesive-like material applied as a part-circular wrapping to the peripheral edges of the rings following their assembly in face-to-face engagement and in axial and circumferential registry on a simple fixture pro vided to receive said rings and which is so formed as initially to assemble said rings in the required orderly array as to form a commercially acceptable staple of such rings.

Still another object of the invention is the provision of a staple of retaining rings capable of being handled as a unitary strip during shipment and when loading a retaining ring dispenser therewith, but which is further constructed and arranged so that the means which holds the multiplicity of rings making up the strip thereof may be simply peeled or stripped therefrom upon the ring staple being finally loaded in the dispenser, thereby to sever the connection between the rings as is necessary to the dispensing of individual rings.

Another important object of the invention is the provision of a simple yet effective method of producing staples of retaining rings which is fast, simple and economical in practice as compared to the prior method of constructing such staples, and which results in the production of a readily available supply of the retaining rings for insertion or loading in a dispenser of the type usually employed to dispense individual rings for assembly in the grooves of shafts, pins or the like.

The above and other objects and advantages of the improved staple of retaining rings and method of producing same according to the present invention will appear from the following detailed description, in which reference is had to the accompanying drawings, wherein:

Fig. 1 is a part-sectional side elevation, and Fig. 2 is an end view, of a staple of retaining rings according to the present invention;

Fig. 3 shows a retaining ring staple or strip as illustrated in Fig. 1 being inserted in a retaining ring dispenser by being slipped over the stack rod thereof;

Fig. 4 is a section along line 4-4 of Fig. 3;

Fig. 5 is a view similar to Fig. 3 but illustrating the staple fully inserted in the dispenser and the flexible ringsecuring means being peeled or stripped from the multiplicit y of rings as conditions them for individual removal from the dispenser stack rod;

Fig. -6 is a perspective View illustrating an early step in the method of producing a staple of retaining rings according to the invention, the ring assembling fixture shown being of a type employed initially to assemble socalled open retaining rings in stack or column formation;

Fig. 7 is a similar view which illustrates the manner of pressing the flexible ring-securing means to the peripheries of the multiplicity of retaining rings making up the stack or column thereof;

Fig. 8 is a section through a modified form of ringassembly fixture and flexible ring-securing means employed in producing staples of retaining rings of the socalled split or nearly closed external (shaft) type; and

Fig. 9 is a view similar to Fig. 8 but illustrating the fixture and flexible ring-securing means used in producing staples of retaining rings of the split or nearly closed internal (housing) type.

Referring to the drawings, reference numeral 10 (Fig. 1) illustrates a completed staple of retaining rings according to the invention ready for packaging or shipment and also for loading into a retaining ring dispenser. Such a retaining ring staple illustratively comprises an array or multiplicity of so-called open retaining rings 11 which, as is well known, are characterized by a gap between their open ends having width as adapts them to be assembled in a shaft groove by being spread over the shaft directly in the plane of the groove but which is less than their inner free diameter, the open retaining ring being further usually characterized by end lugs 12a, 12b and a middle lug 1 3 projecting radially inwardly from its inner edge, as best illustrated in Figs. 2 and 4. According to the invention, the multiplicity of such rings are secured together in face engagement and in axial and circumferential registry, in which the gaps between their open ends and their end and middle lugs are in exact alignment, by means of a length or strip of adhesive tape 15 which, as seen in Figs. 1, 3 and 5, extends substantially the full length of the resulting ring column and is applied as a wrapping which subtends in cross section an arc in excess of about 180 and may extend substantially throughout the full periphery of said rings, of course terminating short of the opening or gap between the ends thereof. By adhesive tape as herein used is meant any strip of pliable material such as paper, fabric, plastic or the like having one surface rendered adhesive by coating the same with a preferably permanently tacky pressure-sensitive adhesive, and it embraces conventional adhesive tape wherein the backing strip is made of fabric, plastic tape sold under the trademark Scotch tape as manufactured by Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company, gummed paper tape, and the so-called pressure-sensitive tapes. To serve the purposes of the invention, the aforesaid adhesive will have binding strength sufiicient to secure the multiplicity of retaining rings making up the staple thereof to the pliable strip and thereby in face engagement and against transverse and angular displacement, and the pliable material making up the strip will have tensile strength greater than the bonding strength of the adhesive whereby the strip may be peeled from the rings when, for example, said rings are held stationary in their own plane by the stack rod of the dispenser. Of course it will be understood also that the bonding strength or adherence between the adhesive and the pliable strip is greater than the bonding strength or adherence obtaining between said adhesive and the edge surfaces of the rings, as results in the adhesive to a large extent coming off with the pliable strip as the latter is peeled from the ring stack, rather than remaining on the ring-edge surfaces as would be very undesirable.

As illustrated in Figs. 1 and 3, the adhesive tape '15 when applied to a stack of rings as shown extends thereabout much as a truss which secures the multiplicity of retaining rings 11 making up the stack together as a relatively rigid, substantially tubular ring package in which the individual rings are disposed in tight face engagement, as well as in orderly array in which the rings are exactly aligned. Accordingly, the multiplicity of rings may be handled as a self-contained strip or package of such rings in both packaging and during shipment of the rings, and equally important, when loading a dispenser with a supply of such rings as is indicated in Fig. 3. In said figure, reference numeral 16 generally designates a ring dispenser of the kind disclosed and claimed in my prior Patent No. 2,712,398, dated July 5, 1955, which employs a stack rod in the form of a spring rail 17 afiixed adjacent its upper end to an upright supporting bracket 18, so that its bottom end may flex with respect to the working surface 1? of the dispenser. Such a dispenser may be quickly loaded with -a supply of retaining rings for oneat-a-time removal simply by slipping a staple 10 of the retaining rings as shown in Fig. 1 on to the upper end of the stack rod 17, the rings threading on to said stack rod and being secured thereby in the well known manner illustrated in Fig. 4. Upon the staple lowering by gravity on to the working surface 19 of the dispenser, as shown in Fig. 5, the adhesive tape 15 may be stripped or peeled off from the ring column, the rings of which are meanwhile held against lateral movement or displacement relative to one another by the longitudinal side edges of the stack rod 17 which engage against the inner edges of the ring end-lugs 12a, 1%, such resulting in the rings being freed of one another and being thereafter held in stack formation solely by the stack rod. Upon removal of the adhesive tape 15, the lowermost ring may be withdrawn from the ring stack by a suitable tool cooperated therewith in the manner explained in my aforesaid Patent No. 2,712,398.

Referring to Figs. 6 and 7, which illustrate one of numerous ways of producing a staple of retaining rings as shown in Fig. 1, reference numeral 20 generally designates a fixture upon which the retaining rings are initially assembled, such illustratively comprising a horizontal base or bed 21 having a longitudinal upright rib 22 extending from its upper surface, the rib terminating in a cross bar 23 dimensioned similarly to the aforesaid stack rod 17 and functioning like the stack rod to mount a plurality of the rings in face engagement and in orderly arrangement in which their gaps and end and middle lugs are axially aligned.

Upon the desired number of rings 11 being threaded on to the cross bar 23 and pressed together, a length of flexible adhesive tape 15 is now placed on the column of rings, said tape being of course disposed with its longitudinal center line coinciding with the vertical center plane of the ring assembly, so that its sides will extend equally around the sides of the rings of the column when pressed down along same. Thereupon the adhesive tape is pressed against the ring column in a wrapping-around operation, as results in said tape sticking or adhering to the outer peripheral edges of the rings and securing said rings together.

While the aforesaid tape-applying operation can of course be performed by hand or by contoured rollers which press the sides of the adhesive tape 15 into ringencircling or wrapping relation, a specially constructed pressure device 26 for accomplishing this purpose has been shown, such illustratively comprising a pair of separable plate-form jaw members 27a, 27b resiliently urged towards one another by springs 28a, 28b shown to encircle the jaw-holding bolts 29a, 2%. Along the adjacent lower corners of said plate jaws 27a, 27b are formed companion recesses 30a, 30b, which together form a part-circular downwardly opening ring recess of diameter corresponding substantially to the outer-edge diameter of the retaining rings 11 being stapled and which extends throughout an arc in excess of whereby the lower edge corners 32a, 32b of said recess are spaced a distance x which is less than said outer edge diameter. Accordingly, as the pressure device 26 is moved downwardly against the column of rings 11 and the adhesive tape 15 placed thereon, the plate jaws 27a, 27b first spread apart to receive the ring column and tape in the ring recess 30a, 30b and then retract or close on said rings and tape. In so doing, the recess edges 32a, 32b wipe the side-edge portions of the tape and thereby press it firmly against the outer peripheral edges of the rings for a distance in excess of 180, as shown in Fig. 2. Thus, upon full closing of the plate jaws 27a, 27b as is shown in Fig. 7, the adhesive tape is firmly adhered to the multiplicity of rings assembled on the fixture thereby to interconnect said rings as a staple or strip thereof capable of being handled as a unitary package.

In fabricating staples of retaining rings of the so-called split or nearly closed external and internal types adapted to be snapped into shaft or housing grooves, respectively, the aforesaid fixture 20 is modified to adapt it to the different internal shape of the latter rings as compared to that of the open ring as shown in Fig. 2. For example, in Fig. 8 which is illustrative of a fixture 20a employed for split shaft (external) rings, the upright web 22a has narrow width corresponding to the narrow width of gap between the open ends of the split or nearly closed ring, and the cross bar 23 (dimensioned as the stack rod 17) is replaced by a rail 23a of circular section substantially corresponding to that of the usually full-circular inner opening of the split or nearly closed external ring. The modified fixture 20b shown in Fig. 9 is one suitable for fashioning staples of split or nearly closed housing (internal) rings and accordingly the upright web 22b has greater width than the aforesaid web 22a so as to correspond to the greater width of gap of the internal ring as compared to the external ring, and the cross bar 23 is replaced by a rail 23b which is circular as is the rail 23a of the Fig. 8 fixture, but of lesser diameter so as to accommodate the radially inturned ears or lugs provided at the ends of the conventional internal ring.

Without further analysis, it will be appreciated that the improved staple or strip of spring retaining rings as described and illustrated herein satisfies the objectives of the invention in highly and effective manner. That is to say, the novel retaining ring staple as proposed is inexpensive to produce, yet the retaining rings making up the same are securely held to one another and in orderly array as prevents the rings becoming entangled both during shipment and when loading a retaining ring dispenser with said rings. However, upon the dispenser being loaded, the connection between the rings may be broken simply by stripping or peeling off the adhesive tape which normally secures them one to the other. Furthermore, since the adhesive tape covers a substantial portion of the outer ring circumference, it also functions to protect the rings as a Whole against atmospheric conditions that might otherwise result in the ring becoming rusted or corroded, and more particularly protects the ring outer edges from being nicked or marred in handling.

In its method aspects, the invention provides a procedure for fashioning staples of retaining rings which is fast, simple and inexpensive in practice as compared to the prior methods employing the rigid bar or strip means for securing the rings of the column together. Moreover, the present method is substantially foolproof and can be practiced by relatively unskilled labor;

As many changes could be made in carrying out the above construction and method without departing from the scope of the invention, it is intended that all matter contained in the foregoing description or shown in the accompanying drawings shall be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limiting sense.

I claim:

An article of manufacture comprising a stack of spring retaining rings each having a gap between their free ends of width less than their inner diameter and being disposed in face engagement and with their gaps in longitudinal alignment, the outer surface of the stack defined by the peripheral edge portions of the rings thereof being a major portion of a circular cylindrical surface, means for securing said stack of rings in substantially rigid condition, said means comprising a strip of pliable material detachably secured to said surface and extending substantially the full axial length of the ring stack and being applied as an external part-cylindrical wrapping forming a truss subtending in cross section an arc in excess of to the peripheral edge portions of the rings thereof opposite to their gaps, thereby to leave said gaps exposed, said strip carrying an adhesive material on its inner face interconnecting the strip and the peripheral edge surfaces only of the rings, said adhesive having bonding strength enabling the strip to temporarily secure the individual rings making up the stack together as a relatively rigid, substantially tubular ring package, said bonding strength being greater between the adhesive and the strip than between the adhesive and the edge surfaces of said rings, and the tensile strength of the pliable material exceeding said bonding strength of the adhesive, the construction and arrangement being such that the staple of rings may be threaded on to the stack rod of a ring dispenser as a self-contained unit and thereupon the rings may be freed from one another for individual movement in their respective planes relative to the stack rod by peeling the pliable strip from the ring stack as the rings thereof are held against lateral movement in their planes by the stack rod.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,026,050 Reber May 14, 1912 1,869,584 Reymond Aug. 2, 1932 1,883,113 Titchener Oct. 18, 1932 2,120,789 Rooth June 14, 1938 2,312,615 Allen Mar. 2, 1943 2,354,083 Bixby July 18, 1944 2,650,722 Stabile Sept. 1, 1953 2,712,398 Erdmann July 5, 1955 2,750,315 Tierney June 12, 1956 

